retired to bed rather later than usual, found himself unexpectedly awake. He was not conscious of any distressing thought or dream, which should have occasioned this shortened slumber, and as he commonly made but one nap of the night, and his rest had been latterly broken by the kind offices he had rendered his comrade, he was half-surprised at finding himself awake. He touched his repeater, and found it only past one o'clock, He turned on the other side, and composed himself afresh. Thoughts of his friend came over his heart, as his cheek reached the pillow, and he said: Poor HAMILTON! Well, GOD have mercy upon us!'

'He felt at the moment that some one near him said, 'Amen!' with much solemnity. He was effectually roused, and asked: Who is there?'

'There was no reply. His voice seemed to echo into HAMILTON's late apartment, and he then remembered that the door was open that communicated between the two rooms. He listened intently, but heard nothing save the beating of his own heart. He said to himself, 'It is all mere imagination,' and again endeavored to compose himself, and think of something else. He laid his head once more upon the pillow, and then he distinctly heard, for the first time, the Major's well-known step. It was not a matter to be mistaken about. The ferule sound, the pause for the foot, the sound again, measured in its return, as if all were again in life. He heard it first upon the piazza, heard it approach, pass through the door from the piazza into the centre apartment, and there it seemed to pause; as if the figure of the departed were standing on the other side of that open door, in the room it had so lately occupied. 'GORDON rose. He went to the window that opened upon the piazza, and looked out. The night was very beautiful; the moon had gone down; the sky was of the deepest azure, and the low dash of the waves upon the rocks, at the foot of the bluff, was the only thing that engaged his notice, except the extreme brightness and lucidity of a solitary star, that traced its glittering pathway of light toward him, across the distant waters of the ocen. All else was still and reposeful. 'It is very remarkable!' said he; 'I could have sworn I heard it!'

'He turned toward the door that stood open between the two rooms. The Major's apartment was darkened by the shutters being closed, and he could distinguish nothing inside it. He wished the door were shut, but felt a repugnance at the idea of closing it; and while he stood gazing into the dark room, the thought of being in the presence of a disembodied spirit rose in his mind; and though a brave man, he could not immediately control the bristling sensation of terror that began to possess him. He longed for the voice of any living being; and though for a moment the idea of ridicule deterred him, he determined on calling up the officer who occupied the other apartment.

'He passed out on to the piazza, and as he approached the other extremity of the building, the sentinel on duty perceiving him, presented arms.

"Have you been long stationed here?' said Captain GORDON.

Half an hour,' was the reply.

"Did you did you happen to see any one on the piazza, during that time?' ''I did not.'

'GORDON returned at once to his room, vexed with himself for having been the sport of an illusion of his own brain. He closed his door and window, and went to bed. He was now thoroughly awake, and had regained, as he thought, entire possession of his faculties. My old comrade,' said he, what could he possibly want of me? We were always friends-kind-hearted, gallant fellow that he was! No man ever was his enemy, except upon the field itself. Why should I have dreaded to meet him, even if such an event could possibly be?'

'And yet, so constituted are we, that a moment or two after this course of thought had occupied his mind, he was almost paralyzed with dread, by the recurrence of the same well-known step that now seemed pacing the dark and tenantless apartment. He even fancied an irregularity in it, that betokened, as he thought, some distress of mind; and all that he had ever heard of spirits revisiting the scenes of their mortal existence, to expiate some hidden crime, entered his imagination, and combined to make his situation awful and appalling. It was therefore with great earnestness that he exclaimed:

''In the name of GOD, HAMILTON, is that you?'

'A voice, from the threshold of the communicating door, addressed him in tones that sank deeply into his soul:

"GORDON, listen, but do not speak to me. In ten days you will apply for a furlough; it will not be granted to you. You will renew the application in three weeks, and then it will be successful. Stay no longer in Scotland than may be necessary for the adjustment of your affairs. Go to London. Take lodgings at No. Jermynstreet. You will be shown into an apartment looking into a garden. Remove the panel from above the chimney-piece, and you will there find papers which establish the fact of my marriage, and will give you the address of my wife and son. Hasten, for they are in deep distress, and these papers will establish their rights. Do not forget me!'

'Captain GORDON did not recollect how long he remained in the posture in which he had listened to the spirit of his departed friend; but when he arose, it was broad day. He dressed himself, and went to town; drew up a statement of the affair, and authenticated it by his oath. He had had no intention of quitting the colony during that year; but an arrival brought intelligence of the death of his father, and of his accession to a large estate. Within the ten days, he applied for a furlough; but such had been the mortality among the officers, that the commanding officer thought proper to refuse his request. Another arrival having however brought to the island a reinforcement for the garrison, he found the difficulty removed, upon a second application, in three weeks. He sailed for Scotland, arranged his affairs, and intended immediately afterward to have proceeded to London. He suffered, however, one agreeable engagement after another to retard his departure, and his friend's concerns, and the preternatural visit that he had received from him, were no longer impressed so vividly as at first upon his mind.

'One night, however, after a social party of pleasure, he awoke without apparent cause, as he had done on the eventful night in Dominica, and to his utter consternation, the sound of the Major's iron step filled his ears.

'He started from his bed immediately, rang up his servant, ordered post-horses, and lost not a moment upon the way, until he reached the house in Jermyn-street. He found the papers as he had expected. He relieved the widow and orphan of his unhappy friend, and established them as such in the inheritance to which they were entitled by his sudden death; and the story reaching the ears of royalty, the young HAMILTON was patronized by the Queen of England, and early obtained a commission in the army, to which he was attached, at the time this tale was told to me.

'It is also known that Captain GORDON rose very high in his military career, and was throughout his life distinguished as a brave and honorable officer, and a fortunate general.'

His fervent reverence and faith are well presented in the annexed most heart-felt lines :

His contrasts in narrative-manner may be gathered from a scene given in a sketch, entitled 'On Rivers and Other Things,' involving a most whimsical account of trying to make a deaf man hear. 'Health' and 'weather' comments had been made, when came the unlucky question: 'Are you fond of FISH?' The subjoined extract will explain itself:

"I THANK YOU,' said the latter, 'the mare is decidedly better; that bleeding in the hoof did her business completely, and I don't doubt that by autumn she will be as well as ever.'

''I asked you,' said the visitor in a determined tone, and like a person who has something to say, 'I asked you, whether you were fond of Fish?. Alas! my masters! how many unnecessary, how many futile, how many absurd questions, among the idle words that are dignified with the title of conversation, are daily propounded in this grave world of ours! Fond of fish! Fond of Fish! and that fish, a Shad! and that shad, a Connecticut-River Shad! and that Connecticut-River Shad, a prime brace of shad! in the highest season, and the highest order, and the finest brace of shad in the entire haul of ENOCH SMITH, now yet quivering, without the loss of one radiant scale, upon the snow-white dresser of this man's imagination! Ought I to call it an imagination? Ought I to go on with the story, or abandon it as an impracticable thing? Fond of Fish!

'Oh! commend me to a life of leisure in a small town upon the right bank of the River Connecticut, and let my lease begin at the beginning of the shad season! Give me ENOCH SMITH to draw the seine, a green lane to conduct me to the river-shore, and a CLAUDE LORRAINE morning for my day of purchase! Fond of Fish! Why, what an idea, to be conveyed upon the subject of this brace of shad, from one Christian Being to another Christian Being, who had both- -as it is to be supposed-read and studied the lives of the apostles! Fond of Fish!!!

'But the stout man, finding that he was not apprehended, reiterated the remarkable question; and, in a still louder tone, exclaimed: 'I-asked-you- whether you-are- -fond-of-FISH?' making a pause between each of these peculiar words, and shooting the last word of the singular interrogatory out of his mouth, by means of his fore-teeth and a most emphatic under-lip, as a boy does a marble with the bent fore-finger and thumb of the right hand.

I perceive,' was the reply, that you are asking me a question; but really the rhumatis has, I think, quite the better of my right ear. Would you do me the favor,' continued he, turning the left side of his head toward his interlocutor with the suavity of a person already obliged; 'would you do me the great favor to repeat your inquiry?'

I asked you,' said the other, growing scarlet in the gills like the shad of his imagination, 'I-merely-asked-you'-for he began (I thought at the time) to grow vexed with the absurdity of his position in having given utterance to a conception at once so feeble and yet so eccentric; and being a coarse man, could only get out by passionately going through what he had to say: 'if-you-were-fond-ofFish? And on this occasion each word seemed to me to have the force of a pistolshot, and the last word that of a cannon-ball; and he rose as he spoke like a man of might and purpose as he was, and clenched his hand, and quivered upon the stout bow legs that sustained him as he stood: Fish,' roared he! FISH,' shouted he! 'I asked you if you were fond of FISH,' thundered he!'

·

I quite regret being so very deaf to-day, and yet I should be sorry,' replied his imperturbable friend, fumbling in his pockets and looking about the couch, to lose any observation of yours, and particularly one in which you seem so earnest; here is a piece of paper, and here is a pencil; be kind enough to write it down while I get on my glasses. By the time his eyes were reinforced the paper was ready, and glancing it over he answered at once, raising himself suddenly upward, as he exclaimed at the utmost reach of his voice, and with deep and increasing energy: 'Oh! Very!' Very!" "VERY!"

Good morning, Mr. JOHNSON,' said his now blown and indignant visitor. 'Are you off? Well, good morning, Captain!' replied the other; and as soon as the door was closed, 'My neighbor Captain TOMPKINS, I am sorry to perceive, has grown quite as deaf as myself,' said he in a musing manner. If I had his legs-'t is there he has the advantage of me-if I had his legs, I could have collected all the news of the parish in the time that he has been prosing here about my mare! And I wanted too to know something this morning about shad. Here, SALLY! tell Boв to run down the lane and find out whether ENOCH SMITH is going to draw soon; and if Вов meet any persons on the way with shad, let him ask the price of the day before he says a word to SMITH.'

The same deep religious feeling, the same spirit of self-abasement and spiritual devotion, which characterize 'Nearer to THEE,' distinguish also 'Lines written in Affliction,' from which we select a brief but characteristic passage: 'OH! raise thy thoughts toward thy Heavenly KING! Let not His quickening grace be wholly lost; Perchance even yet thy wilderness may bloom Beneath His smile, and blossom as the rose!

My soul! whom hast thou in the Heavens like HIM?

Or on the earth to be compared to HIM?

Are not thine idols fallen?-one by one,

Thy bloom, thy youth, thy strength, thy friends, thy pride,
Thy ready confidence, thy force of mind-

Have they not all departed? What is left?

What idle meteor lures thee back to dust

From HIM, to whom thy happier thoughts aspire?

Raise thee, oh! raise thee! "quit this vacant star,
Mount with the morning to the gates of heaven:

There plead, and hope; confide, and be forgiven !
So shall thy present sorrow turn to joy
Ineffable; and the dark cloud of grief
Shall pass from off the face of thy sad breast,

Before the smile of His effulgent love;

His, thine ascended SAVIOUR's, beam of Grace!
Thy life shall wear a charm unknown before,
And with the royal Psalmist shalt thou sing
In holy rapture, to affliction's praise!'

We shall hope, as we have intimated, to do better justice to the personal and literary character of the lamented subject of these hurried remarks hereafter.

' Turkle's Dinner, which was the next in order of the
'Sparks and Cinders from the Grate-Blower,

SNAP FIFTH.

'Or course you've been to Quaker Meetin':

'Of course you 've read about Quaker Meetin':

'Of course you think there's nothing 'smart' left to be written about Quaker Meetin'.

'Notwithstanding all which 'courses' of objections and obstacles, I am going to write about Quaker Meetin'.

The reason is, that I went to Quaker Meetin' last Sunday- with Turkle. TURKLE came down to our house,' clad in complete gray-in fact, looking perfectly AMINADAB-SLEEKISH. He even had a gray silk pocket-handkerchief. 'MARK,' said he, does thee intend to go to our meetin' this morning?' "Well, brother TURKLE, if you'll take me under your ‘gray-goose-wing,' (I beg your pardon,) I will gladly join the Society's 'Sabbath-council."

"Thee must mind thy Ps and Qs, then, and not look carnally at the sisters, nor wriggle thy features into ungodly smiles; nor blow thy nose over-loud; nor take off thy hat, except when the Spirit moveth a brother or a sister unto prayer.'

'And in meek obedience to Brother T.'s instructions, I took my seat at his side upon a 'back bench' at the Meetin'.

'The Meetin'- House was full. The men sat upon the hardest of benches, with the stiffest of backs, and a general air of wry-neck-edness pervaded them. On the women's seats I remarked drab cushions, at intervals peeping from mousecolored skirts. The rows of bonnets, (if the head-gear of the female Q's can be so called,) all of a serious tint, between white and old-shingle-color, reminded me, looking at them from behind, of a battalion of sheep's-heads close-sheared, some washed, and some weather-stained.

'Upon the raised benches at the farther end, sat on one side, six unmitigated broad-brims; on the other, seven uncompromising sheep's-heads: (I speak respectfully, and in a PICKWICKIAN sense.) The silence was audible.

'It was half-past ten A. M.

'TURKLE gradually subsided into a serene slumber, real or feigned.

'An hour past on; TURKLE awoke,' to the consciousness of 'something going on!' The fact was, that at the end of this hour's silence, one of the six unmitigated ones rose suddenly, as if some body had inserted a pin into his person, took off his broad-eaved roof, and began to sing; (as I supposed, but TURKLE said, in the faintest whisper, 'exhort.') The unmitigated then rose with

a jerk, and exhorted for half-an-hour, while I took a mental portrait of him; but the only trace of it that has remained upon my bump of what-d'ye-callem, is a wig-block, painted yellowish-white, with two brown ridges across the forehead; (the eyes were kept closed, or at least, seemed so, from where I sat ;) a shadow, as of a miniature pump-handle, down the middle-face, and a three-cornered hole near the base. The pith of his exhortation escaped me, but the subject was 'Gifts.' I remember this, because, about the centre of his song-exhortation, I mean a small white object suddenly appeared near the tip of my nose, with a gray glove backing it, and perceiving it to be a slip of paper with writing thereon, I took it and read as followeth :

'OH! wad some power the giftie gie us

To see oursel's as ithers see us.'

'The half-hour being up, the unmitigated went down with another jerk, as if a mattress had fallen on his head, and roofed himself again.

'After which there was a second eloquent silence of twenty minutes :

'Followed by a rise on the part of one of the uncompromising sheep's-heads, who delivered herself - of a prayer for quaker children who were forsaking drab ways, and hankering after crinoline, or strip-ed pantaloons.

'After which, silence, for a third time,

'LIKE a poultice, came

To heal the blows of sound.'

'Ten minutes having elapsed, the unmitigated, who had exhorted, was suddenly seized with a silent out-burst of sentiment and fraternal feeling toward the unmitigated next him, which he exhibited by rising and cordially shaking hands with said unmitigated No. Two. At this demonstration, there was an universal rise in 'shad,' and the meetin' dissolved.

'We stood on the bank as the stream flowed by, and having passed the whole shoal in review, passed ourselves out.

"MARCUS PHYPPS,' commenced TURKLE, as we wended, 'I'll tell thee what. There was a deal of good sense and sound logic in Brother WHIFFLIN's exhortation, and

"So there was! Was he the ZERUBABEL WHIFFLIN who -?'

“Y-e-a! (don't interrupt me!) and Sister DEBORAH's prayer was a sincere out-pouring of the spirit. Crinoline, brother MARCUS, is a national curse: a world-wide curse: its untimely and exaggerated expansion has been the prime cause of the pressure in every thing else.

"PHYPPS; Nota-bene: There was n't a pretty Quakeress in meetin'. "So there was n't. Are you going to dine with me?'

"No!

before dinner?'

What was that you said just now about a little whiskey-and-water

(I had not intimated 'the remotest.')

"Well, MARC, I don't know but it would be 'medicinally useful.”’ 'We went into our house.' The old Bourbon was handed forth. Mr. TURkle helped himself, and holding the glass admiringly between his eye and the window : 'You do n't drink whiskey, I think,' said he gravely. 'Young, vigorous men like you should never indulge in strong drink. You don't need it: you don't want any artificial stimulus; but (here he took a sip) when a man is past middle age, (here he took another,) even if it is n't very pleasant, (here he took a third,) something of the kind is necessary to accelerate the circulation, and assist digestion; and though I don't like liquor — especially whiskey, (here he finished the glass 28

VOL. LI.